vendredi 17 janvier 2014

Eritrea: A horrible human trafficking in our eyes!!*

Eritrean
youths are being kidnapped by senior military officers, smuggled into Sudan and
held to ransom, according to a report by Dutch and Swedish researchers. The
captives are threatened with being sold to people traffickers if they do not
raise tens of thousands of dollars. Some are freed if they raise the ransoms.
Others are sold on to Bedouin traffickers in Sinai, even after money has
changed hands, only to be tortured to extract further cash from their relatives.

Basing
their findings on interviews with 230 Eritreans who suffered this fate, the
researchers conclude that between 2007 and 2012, some 25,000 to 30,000 people
were trafficked. The report, by Meron Estefanos, a Swedish human rights
activist, and Professor Mirjam van Reisen and Dr Conny Rijken of Tilburg
University in the Netherlands, estimates that $600m has been extracted in this
way.

Eritrea's
military is trafficking the nation's children.

In
the report, The Human Trafficking Cycle: Sinai and Beyond, published on
Wednesday, researchers accuse Eritrea's Border Surveillance Unit, under the
command of General Teklai Kifle (alias Manjus), of being at the heart of these
operations. The United Nations has named the general and several of his senior
officers, as being involved in human trafficking, but this is the first time
first-hahe Eritrean government requires every pupil to complete their final
year of high school by serving in Sawa Military Camp, in the desolate,
semi-desert region of eastern Eritrea.

This
means that most 16- and 17-year old children go there to complete their
studies. The study interviewed an Eritrean woman living in Sweden who told them
her son was abducted from the camp. He and six other children were forced into
a car by a high-ranking Sawa military officer and driven into Sudan. Once
there, they were made to call their parents, who were given three days to pay $
7,500 or they would be sold to traffickers. Eritreans know what such a fate
holds in store: imprisonment in underground cells and systematic torture while
their screams are played to relatives on mobile phones. Girls are regularly
raped, sometimes repeatedly and in public. Until they can pay up, there is
little hope of escape.

What
is theprice
of aslaveEritreantoday?

These
particular children were lucky. When the money was paid, they were freed in the
Sudanese capital, Khartoum. The researchers believe this was not an isolated
incident. They quote several reports dated October 2013 indicating that 211
children were kidnapped from the camp and a ransom of $10,000 demanded for each
of their release.

"Some
Eritreans are keen to be smuggled out of the country," Van Reisen told the Guardian, "but some of
those who are abducted had no intention of leaving Eritrea". She cites the example of a mother of three who
explained how she was kidnapped in the Eritrean capital, Asmara.The woman, who
cannot be named, says she went to a meeting with a business partner in the
city. The next thing she remembers was waking up in the Sudanese border town of
Kassala. She, and three other captives, were told that if they didn't pay
$10,000 each within a few days, they would be sold to Bedouin traffickers in
Sinai. The families of the woman and three men paid the ransom demanded, but
instead of being released they were taken to the Sinai, where a further $35,000
was demanded. Eventually some of the hostages were freed, only to be arrested
by Egyptian troops. The woman is now reported to be staying in a house in
Sinai, waiting to travel to Cairo.

Between 5,000 and 10,000 of the hostages died or
were killed in captivity.

Van
Reisen and her colleagues say that many Eritreans do not survive the
trafficking and the torture. They estimate that between 5,000 and 10,000 of the
hostages died or were killed in captivity. In some groups as many as half lost
their lives. Children as young as two or three years old are among the victims.
Even after they escape the clutches of the people traffickers, the Eritreans
are not safe. In 2012 the Israeli government adopted an anti-infiltration law -using a term normally reserved for Palestinians attempting to enter the
country. This definition has been extended to African migrants, and since July
2012 refugees and asylum seekers entering Israel have been detained. A new fence
has been built along the Israel-Egyptian border in Sinai, and groups of
Eritrean survivors of torture huddle against it, unable to proceed.

Qui êtes-vous ?

Born August 18, 1953 at Mugwata, North Kivu, DRC. Degree in History at the University of Lubumbashi. Degree in Development Studies at the University of Geneva. Author: République Démocratique du Congo. Les générations condamnées. Déliquescence d’une société pré-capitaliste (D.R.C.. Generations convicted) Publibook, Paris, 2006. L’Envers du parchemin (The other side of the parchment), novel, Publibook, Paris, 2006. Dictionnaire biographique des Africains (Biographical Dictionary of Africans), Editions Le Cri, Bruxelles, 2012. All his books have been published by NENA (Nouvelles Editions Numériques Africaines)and are available online now.